Vaquero

QUICK FACTS

• Hometown: Monterrey, Mexico
• Album in stores (Mexico): Thursday, September 8th (digital distribution in the US through CD Baby, soon on major legal downloads websites)
• Did a version of The Guess Who’s classic “American Woman” for the mexican-bolivian feature film “American Visa”. The track will be the first single and video extracted from the soundtrack.
• Reached the Top 10 on the three major sales chart in the country (Mixup, Tower Records and Sahari’s) just one week after release date. They keep a steady pace on the Amprofon Top 100 (Mexico's equivalent to Billboard's 200), which compiles all the sales charts in the country.
• Looking for licenses or distribution in the US, Europe and South America, aiming for a first quarter of 2006 release.

OFFICIAL WEBSITE AND ALTERNATE SITES

www.ilovevaquero.com
www.myspace.com/ilovevaquero
www.sonicbids.com/vaquero

“A remarkable album from an export quality band...” ****
- Alejandro Carranco, Rolling Stone México

“Vaquero posess an outstanding reach... An amazing sonic experience” ****
- Maraliza, Revista Switch

BIO

Gerardo Garza (Chetes) and Maurizio Terracina, the songwriting masterminds behind this power trio, go way back. It was 1993 in Monterrey –Mexican cradle of the eclectic and influential alt-music movement that gave birth to household names as Kinky, Control Machete and Plastilina Mosh- when these then 13 year-olds unpretentiously decided they wanted to follow the footsteps of their international music idols and form their own band. It was a time before the music industry’s radar was set to this 6 million people industrial capital, the city was virgin territory waiting to be discovered and the music scene was ready for something important... The cork was about to pop.

These two adventurous teenagers began playing tirelessly with their high school buddies, going from sextet Zurdok Movimento to quartet Zurdok during eight successful years and three genre defining, critically acclaimed albums with Universal Music México. On 2002 the band members took separate ways, but the core wunderpair were not to give up music, and after a much helpful and necessary one-year hiatus, they decided to embark on a new adventure named VAQUERO and started writing and producing songs with a very focused objective, the international market.

Going from subtle to ecstatic, from silence to outburst, power-trio VAQUERO delivers a collection of carefully manufactured tunes, which become the most powerful force behind them: small masterpieces with simple lyrics that bring Lennon and Yorke to the crossroads of the new music industry. And even though they tried to keep the project under wraps until all the pieces of the puzzle were in place, critics and fans immediately found out about the band’s plan and officially pushed them to kick-start the project, which opened with a surprise debut at LAMC (Latin Alternative Music Conference) Los Angeles in August 2003.

Strategic planning followed this showcase, and the threesome (completed by Rodrigo Guardiola on drum duties) chose California and Texas for a first round of presentations that started creating awareness in the US. Rave reviews started to appear, and David Lynch’s quote from The Austin Chronicle summed it up just right: “VAQUERO’s music is up melodic, crescendo rock that never betrays the talented hands that made it. Singing in English with an Anglo veneer that could just as easily been from Denver to Liverpool, instead of the Mexican Capital, the future of music is in good hands.”

Before releasing their debut album, the band had already scored a No. 1 hit on the influential station Radio Ibero 90.9 (Mexico City’s equivalent to KCRW in LA), performed at important music festivals in Latin America (Vive Latino and Manifest) and the US (SXSW and LAMC) and been special guests at the Latin MTV Video Music Awards. VAQUERO was also chosen by Placebo to be their opening act on their Mexico tour, was the Top 3 EPK at Sonicbids.com for more than two months, and keeps adding people to their ever growing fan base.

Now that their debut album is finally out, the band will follow a carefully designed plan aimed to reinforce their presence in their home market, translate it to record sales and touring, and keep spreading the word out in the major markets of US and Europe, looking for the right label to team up with and reach international audiences.